GB badminton eyes China downfall

Britain's badminton players can topple China's top talent according to the boss of England's governing body.

The Chinese won eight medals, including three golds at the Beijing Olympics, while British pair Nathan Robertson and Gail Emms lost in the quarter-finals.

Badminton England chief executive Adrian Christy told BBC Sport: "We are coming in after a successful era, but we're building for 2012 and beyond.

"There will be no compromise. China are the competition but we can be bigger."

Badminton England's directive is developing the current crop of international players and the young prospects coming through to the Elite senior level, as well as providing a pathway for producing talent for the Olympics.

Christy, who oversees the development of the sport in England and Britain, is targeting two medals at London 2012.

He is looking to improve on the mixed doubles bronze won by Simon Archer and Joanne Goode in 2000 and the Athens silver in won by Robertson and the now-retired Emms in 2004.

Following the lack of medals at last year's Olympics, Christy added: "We did well in Athens and Sydney and we were close in Beijing.

"Although we had tough draws in China, the fact of the matter is that we didn't deliver."

As well as performance director Ian Moss, the responsibility of this delivery that Christy is demanding also lies in the hands of the recently-appointed Ian Wright and Andy Wood.

Wright, former national head coach, is the new performance manager and Wood, team GB manager in Beijing, is the new Olympic team boss for London.

Wood led Team GB in Beijing, while Wright guided England to bronze in the Sudirman Cup in 2007 and successive silvers in the European team championships in 2007 and 2008 and was also GB and England coach in Beijing.

With six high performance centres in England and a base in Milton Keynes the future looks even brighter for the sport in Britain.

"We do have a lot of emerging players but in the long term we have to compete with the Asians and increase the base of players," Wright said, adding that Gabby White, 18, and Chris Adcock, 20, were great prospects.

"There have been some uneasy times but we now have to create more competition for players for the English and British programs.

This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.